


Kintsugi

by Tabata



Series: Leoverse [145]
Category: Glee
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:03:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22850674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabata/pseuds/Tabata
Summary: Adam and Annie are in Japan to do an on-site investigation and, even 6,303 miles away, Leo can't stop being a nuisance.
Series: Leoverse [145]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/30541





	Kintsugi

**Author's Note:**

> **WARNING:** This story is an **AU** from the original 'verse. What happens in here has little to none correlation with what happens in Leonard Karofsky-Hummel VS The world or Broken Heart Syndrome. The characters involved are (mostly) the same, but situations and relationships between them may be completely different.  
> In this particular verse Blaine and the boys (and girl) are a criminal team, very much like the one you can find in certain kind of movies or tv series (anyon said Leverage?), that's specialized in thefts. At some point, Federal Agent Sam Vanderbilt (yes, she finally has a surname) made a deal with them: all their records will be erased if they start working with the government.
> 
> written for: COW-T #10  
> prompt: Theater - “Stop texting me weird stuff so late at night” - Obsession

According to Adam's tourist guide, the Kabuki-za in Ginza is the theater to go if you want to see some traditional kabuki drama in Tokyo. He tried to get all information he could about this particular art and even bought their tickets well in advance to make sure they were going to make it to the show. He's so excited for tonight that, for the first time since he can remember, he's not afraid of showing it. Annie made a mocking remark or two back at their hotel, but even then he didn't care, that's how happy he is to be doing something like this tonight.

The theater was built in 1924 in a baroque Japanese revivalist style – Adam had to open four different tabs on his browser to understand what that meant – and it recalls the architecture of old Japanese castles and temples. It looks like something out of an old tale had magically appeared among the super futuristic skyscrapers. 

As they approach the theater, Adam has to stop several times to take pictures, sometimes of the building alone, sometimes of Annie in front of it or _showing_ it to the camera. He rarely brings his reflex with him – one because he's not usually the one who does on-site investigations, and two because even when he does, they're always in a hurry and there's no time to do anything but what they came to do – but this time is different.

Blaine gave him and Annie three whole weeks to look around and get the practical information they need – escape routes, security on site, daily habits of the key people they need to con and, in Annie's case, prepare herself to be the insider, all the usual stuff – which allows them some time for sightseeing too. It's going to be a nice little holiday. Three weeks of work, yes, but also three weeks of absolute peace and relaxation before Leo joins them to start whatever technological preparation he needs in order to let them into the systems of the Meshiwa Corporation, this monstrous conglomerate they would have never chosen as a target if they weren't backed by the FBI.

Leo was obviously furious – when is he not? – that Adam and Annie were going to Japan without him, but he had to finish another job first and no pouting or nervous breakdown could force Blaine to change his mind about not letting him go. Besides, Leo is literally the only one who can do whatever it is that he does with computers so, as annoying as he is, they can't just spare him to send him on holiday if he has to do something else. 

“I know you'd like to take a picture of every inch of this beautiful place,” Annie says to him, leaning forward to place herself between the camera and a single cherry blossom lying romantically on one of the many decorations of the building. “But we're going to miss the show.”

“I'm sorry. You're right.” He takes the picture anyway – of her, though – and even so up close, she looks amazing. “But I have to come back here during the day because I bet the light is priceless.”

Annie chuckles and takes him by the arm as they enter the theater, following the very tidy (and very quiet) queue of other patrons. Adam had permission from Blaine to spend as much as he needed to, so he bought first class tickets: dead-center front row seats. They are going to enjoy the performance a few inches away from the performers themselves. 

It doesn't matter if he knows almost nothing about Japanese traditions and history. He will experience this performance in the purest of forms: through the music and the visuals, the colors and the body interpretation. It's not about following the plot, it's about diving into something beautiful and letting it inspire him. 

Blaine told him once that being broken is not the end of the journey but the start; that life is the process of healing the scars you've got along the road. Sometimes they are just scratches on the surface, sometimes they are entire pieces of you missing that you need to replace. Blaine believes that there's always a way to fix what has been broken, it's only a matter of finding how.

Adam feels like, in his case, it's not really a scar but more of a red stain on his conscience, a stain the size of his stepfather head on the floor of his mother's kitchen in Lima, Ohio. The only way he found to erase it – or at least to make it less visible – is art. Drawing, painting, taking photos or simply enjoying something made by someone else. Anything goes as long as it gives him something to scratch that stain away. As long as it reminds him that he is not the boy who almost beat a man to death.

That was one time in his life – one single time – that doesn't define him.

Adam knows he is the _muscle_ of the team, but he made a promise to himself and to Blaine as well. He was going to protect them all the best way he could, but he would never – ever! – go the length he went that time for his mother. That's why he takes martial arts lessons to learn how to control his strength. That is why he refuses to use weapons. Determination and control and art reminding him who he really is, that is what's going to heal him.

“It's starting!” Annie whispers, squeezing his arm excitedly. That brings Adam back to the present and he's grateful for that.

The performance has just started – and it's quite an experience having no clue of what's being said – when the first message arrives. Adam checks his phone, and when he sees it's Leo, he just puts it back in his pocket. Leo keeps texting him though. One, two, three times and counting. He can be obsessive when he wants to – and he always wants because obsessive is one of the things he is. Most of the others Adam can't say out loud without being crass.

He could ignore him, but it's hard to sit on his ass when it's vibrating.

Adam?  
Adam, R U there?  
I need to talk to U.  
Not a life-or-death situation, but it's urgent.  
Adaaaaaaaaam?

What?

Good. You're awake. It's night there, isn't it?

10pm. What do you want?  
Be quick. I'm at the theater.

What theater?

Leo, ffs.

Right. I need a favor. 

Elaborate.

There's a salty watermelon Pepsi in Japan. I need it.

Adam looks at the display and wonders why is he even _answering_ him when he could simply turn his phone off and be done with him. Blaine, Cody and Matt are there, he should just let him be their problem and live his life like God intended: without him constantly annoying him. The fact that Adam is not even surprised to receive these kind of messages from him says a lot about Leo's habits. Everything he does is random or sudden. He sits still for ten minutes, then he suddenly stands up and walks incessantly around the room like his life depended on it. One moment he's reading a book and the moment after he's watching one single scene of a TV show and then it's back to his book again. He shows up in your room at random hours to ask you things that make no sense. And sometimes his brain wakes him up in the middle of the night (or at dawn, which is the same for him) with a request and he can't go back to sleep until he fulfills it, no matter what is it.

Adam, please.  
Adam?

You're gonna get it once you're here in three weeks.

No. I need it now.  
It should go between the Blue Hawaii  
and the Ice Cucumber  
but I don't have it and it's draining me out.

I don't know what U R talking about.

My collection!

Collection is a very wide term with him as he collects _everything_. Or better, he _keeps_ everything, so everything becomes a collection. From the bottle caps – that he builds towers with when he's anxious – to candy wrappers – that he makes tons of crane and stars origami with when he's being hyperactive – to action figures, to cards, to shoelaces and hairpins or the tiny plastic spoon they give you with gelato sometimes – all colorful things that attracts him like a crazy magpie. He's an anxious hoarder and his room looks like a bomb exploded in a 20th century junk museum. Among all those rubbish, Adam remembers, there are several bottles of unopened Pepsi.

Can't you buy it on-line?

No one sells it.  
I need you to send it to me.  
Priority mail.  
Please.  
I'm going crazy.

You already are.  
I'm sending it to you tomorrow.

I <3 U

Just stop texting.

I'm gone. Love U.

*

At 8:30 the morning after it's hard to explain to Annie why they're queuing at a Japanese post office to send a bottle of Pepsi in the United States without sounding like a sappy idiot. In fact, he fails miserably.

“You could have said no to him, you know?” She tells him. “He gets obsessive, but it doesn't mean you have to give in to everything he asks for. Actually, I'm quite surprised you did. You're always very mean to him. Sometimes even too much. You always say horrible things to him.”

Adam shrugs. “It's easier to indulge him when it's just a bottle of soda.”

He has wrapped the bottle in bubble wrap and he has put it in a box, which the post office employee is now taking from his hands with a nod. Adam watches him putting it on a scale, hoping it won't explode or something during the trip. 

“Why do you think it was so important for him?” Annie asks.

“He likes to put things together.”

Like he can't do with his thoughts most of the time.

It's Leo's way to heal.

Each of them has their own.

And it makes sense, after all.


End file.
